A Method for the Determination of Nicotine in Lung Tissue of Hamsters / Eine Methode zur Bestimmung des Nikotins in Hamsterlungen

A method for the determination of nicotine in lung tissue is presented. The nicotine is extracted from homogenized lung tissue by means of a mixture of hydrochloric acid and methanol. It is then spectrophotometrically determined after the disturbing accompanying substances have been eliminated by a preliminary acid steam distillation. The method's inferior limit of detection is 40 µg of nicotine contained in 3 lungs, which corresponds to 17.7 µg of nicotine per gramme of lung tissue. In the case of nicotine contents of 50 µg per analytical procedure the standard deviation of the method was found to be 1.7 µg, and the resulting coefficient of variation was calculated to be 3.4 %. The procedure is simple and therefore suitable for the study of numerous samples. The exposure of hamsters to inhaled raw cigarette smoke revealed that the nicotine content of lungs of experimental animals augments with the number of burnt cigarettes and the duration of inhalation. The reproducibility of Dontenwill's inhalation procedure was tested and proved to be satisfactory. The coefficient of variation within two series of inhalation experiments was found to be between 4.1 and 5.2 %